After Zac Brown Band played a two-night stand at Boston's Fenway Park last weekend, the group's frontman told the crowd they'd had the "best nights" in their career.

Fortunately that personal highlight didn't deflate the Georgia band in any perceptible way as it took residence on the Marcus Amphitheater stage Thursday night for a 2 and 1/2 hour show. After all, with the good-timing, warm-weather tones of the band's escapist opener "Jump Right In," Summerfest is a much more fitting venue than a ballpark, right? | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article

The Fray

Five years ago, the Fray headlined the Marcus Amphitheater, but Thursday it had to settle for Summerfest's second-highest-capacity stage, the Miller Lite Oasis. The Oasis was packed, and frontman Isaac Slade was earnest and emotive as always for "Look After You" and treated the show with the significance of an amphitheater-packing spectacle. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article

Fast-rising R&B star SoMo and I took a "Ride" together at Summerfest Thursday before his headlining show at the Uline Warehouse.

Now, it wasn't the kind of, ahem, "ride" he's referring to in his hit song of the same name. Instead, we boarded the Summerfest skyglider for a tour above the grounds and talked about the new album he's working on, what it's like to get 100 million YouTube views, and getting praise from Ginuwine--with some interruptions from female fans screaming down below. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Blog Post

For the 28th time, Early Music Now will offer Milwaukee audiences a time-traveling season of music from the medieval era to the Baroque. Here's a look at the 2014-'15 EMN lineup, which includes a post-season concert:

OK, it's formally called the Illinois Shakespeare Festival, but a friendly vibe pervades the rehearsal spaces for this festival, based at Illinois State University. Artistic director Kevin Rich is as serious as any theater professional about his productions, but he also happily delivers freeze pops to actors and technicians in the middle of a sweltering rehearsal. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article(1)

Below is the first trailer for "Jimi: All Is By My Side," the Jimi Hendrix biopic by John Ridley, the Oscar-winning screenwriter of "12 Years a Slave" and a Mequon native. It stars Andre Benjamin, also known as Andre 3000 of Outkast, which played Summerfest last week.

When I talked to Ridley last year, he said the film takes place in 1966-'67, just before Hendrix became a superstar. This let him "tell a finite story" and gave him the "opportunity to excavate a single year. it makes more storytelling sense to mine those moments" than to offer a "cradle-to-grave" retrospective. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Blog Post

Paul's Alley Cinema

"Yankee Doodle Dandy": What better way to celebrate the Fourth of July than watching James Cagney's Oscar-winning performance as America's ultimate flag-waver, George M. Cohan? The 1942 musical is one of Hollywood's best biopics. 8:45 p.m. Friday, with a short subject before the main feature. Free. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article

Imaginatively directed by John Roberts, the playful, dreamlike treatment, chronicling a fantastical voyage for a young woman (Ashley Esselmann) who's seemingly been in a car crash, features animation and live action, blending kooky choreographed dance moves in an operating room, a wall-busting CGI monster, and a dazzling and detailed, steampunk-style animated post-apocalyptic landscape. It's just as wild and bold as the local soul pop band's unpredictable music and live show. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article

This season of ABC's "The Bachelorette" has taken contestants to France, Italy and Belgium. Next on the lineup: Milwaukee. The city will be featured on Monday's episode as one of the series' four "hometown dates" when Nick Viall, 33, of Waukesha, brings bachelorette Andi Dorfman to Wisconsin.

Viall, currently living in Chicago, is one of the four remaining contestants competing for Dorfman's affections. The hometown dates — a staple of the "Bachelor/Bachelorette" series — give the remaining contestants an opportunity to take Dorfman home to meet their families and explore the town in which they were raised. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article(1)

The origins of Bear Hands have something to do with a girlfriend who became an ex-girlfriend, but the ex-boyfriend — Bear Hands co-founder and lead singer Dylan Rau — gladly clarified that she wasn't the sole cause of his creative burst.

"I'd been writing songs since I was 13," he said during a recent phone interview. "This idea didn't pop into my head at 19 because of a girl." | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article

Mötley Crüe may be coming to an end — but the band will never truly die.

In its '80s heyday, the outrageous glam metal group of frontman Vince Neil, bassist Nikki Sixx, drummer Tommy Lee and guitarist Mick Mars made its place in rock history as one of the most notoriously hedonistic bands that ever lived. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article(3)

Players from the Green Bay Packers and the Milwaukee Brewers will battle in Ping-Pong competition on Sept. 7.

SURG on Water will host the Ping-Pong Challenge for Charity between the Packers, Brewers and local media personalities to benefit Children's Hospital of Wisconsin. So far, the Packers' John Kuhn and Brewers' Jonathan Lucroy, Kyle Lohse and Ryan Braun have signed on. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article

But what happens if that conflict is transformed into collaboration? What happens if masters of industry work with the inspiration of artists to engender new ideas? This pairing may at first appear unlikely, but it's what has been going on for 40 years at the Kohler Company near Sheboygan. The result is one of the most important exhibits to occur in Wisconsin this summer. | July 3, 2014»Read Full Article

It might feel a little like summer has taken a powder, but the big bangs of summer are here today.

The U.S. Bank Fireworks explode over Lake Michigan off Veterans Park at 9:30 p.m. (Check out Tap Milwaukee for a list of other area fireworks tonight and tomorrow night.) | July 3, 2014»Read Full Blog Post